CFMEU inquiry LIVE updates: Union leaders called as witnesses for Queensland probe’s second hearing block

Good morning, and welcome back to our live coverage of the Queensland government’s Commission of Inquiry into the CFMEU and Misconduct in the Construction Industry.

On the witness list this week are two prominent union leaders, the boss of the peak body of civil engineering contractors, and a senior bureaucrat:

• Jacqueline King, general secretary, Queensland Council of Unions
• Stacey Schinnerl, AWU Queensland branch secretary
• Damien Long, CEO, Civil Contractors Federation Queensland
• Sarina Wise, executive director of compliance and field services, Workplace Health and Safety Queensland

AWU Queensland secretary Stacey Schinnerl.Credit: Facebook

Wise was also named on the list of witnesses two weeks ago, but the entire week of hearings was taken up with CFMEU administrator Mark Irving and his investigator Geoffrey Watson.

If you need to catch up on what happened in that block of hearings, read our live coverage of day one, day two and day three. Or read Matt Dennien’s analysis of six key takeaways from that week.

On Friday, the commission launched a confidential hotline as it appealed for workers and others to come forward with information about misconduct, intimidation, violence, or corruption in the building industry.

“The Commission urges anyone with relevant information to share what they know and assist in supporting a safer and more accountable construction sector in Queensland,” it said.

Meanwhile, the Crisafulli government has spruiked the completion of work on the northbound Centenary Bridge on the weekend as a defeat for the maligned union.

Construction on the Centenary Bridge upgrade at Jindalee.Credit: BMD

The construction site at the Brisbane River between Kenmore and Jindalee was ground zero for some of the violence detailed in the first week of inquiry hearings, as AWU members clashed with the CFMEU. Expect to hear more about it this week.

“We have rid this project of the union’s militant tactics, which resulted in workers intimidated and Brisbane commuters enduring daily gridlock, and are getting on with the job of getting this infrastructure project delivered,” said Transport Minister Brent Mickelberg.

In case you missed it, last week our state politics reporter Matt Dennien reported on a flawed arrangement between the industrial relations office and Queensland police, which allowed CFMEU officials who had been stripped of their right of entry permits to argue their way onto building sites for years.

The flawed memorandum of understanding allowed banned CFMEU officials to argue their way onto worksites.Credit: Monique Westermann

And the public servant listed as the point of contact for any dispute where police were called was the same person described in inquiry hearings as having a “very close relationship” with “somebody senior in the CFMEU office”.

Helen Burgess, who was disciplined over how she dealt with a CFMEU complaint sent to her personal phone, was named in investigator Geoffrey Watson’s June report into violence in the union as a former bureaucrat who was being probed by the Crime and Corruption Commission.

According to Watson’s evidence to the state government inquiry into the union, the unnamed union official and Burgess, then the Workplace Health and Safety’s construction compliance and field services director, wielded their power to order inspectors around.

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